Annual award given to students for extracurricular involvement

Three students were inducted into the Tricolour Society on Sunday for their extracurricular involvement during their time at Queen’s.

Each year, the Tricolour Award is presented to students for making an impact through their non-athletic and non-academic activities.

Christina Clare, ArtSci ’10, was nominated for her work in queer activism.

“You never do work thinking, ‘I’m going to be nominated for something,’” she said.

Clare has been involved in the Positive Space program since her first year at Queen’s.

She co-chaired the Education on Queer Issues Project (EQuIP) in 2007-08. That year, she and co-chair Anna Fischer took the Pride Week portfolio out of EQuIP and started Queen’s Pride Project (QPP).

“This was done so they [EQuIP and QPP] could both focus on their own mandates,” she said, adding that it also stabilized funding for some queer initiatives on campus.

Clare said EQuIP is funded by the AMS, which means the group doesn’t qualify for an opt-outable student fee to help finance it. QPP, on the other hand, can go to referendum to introduce a fee.

“It gave QPP the option of an optional fee for a stable and consistent budget every year to run Pride Week,” she said.

Clare said she thinks the award sends a strong that doing anti-oppression work on campus is valuable.

“It shows we recognize not only is [queer activism] worthwhile for those marginalized groups, it’s also recognized by a wider audience as well.” Paula Mosbrucker, MA ’10, said she was shocked but excited when she learned she was one of the recipients of the award.

“I was at my house watching the Oscars with my housemates.

… It was the first time in my life I’ve actually eclipsed James Cameron,” she said, adding that for her it’s a humbling experience.

“I really worked in the area of academic representation in terms of curriculum development, tuition policy and the greater University vision with the Engineering Society and in conjunction with the AMS in a number of roles,” she said, adding that she was also chair of the Campus Bookstore’s board of directors.

Mosbrucker said she thinks she’s been successful in her time at Queen’s in ensuring that students have an opportunity to voice their thoughts on academic representation.

“The thing I really tried to do was to rethink the model for academic representation in terms of making sure that more students have an ability to really, constructively contribute to higher-level university dialogue,” she said.

Mosbrucker said she’s not sure yet what she’s going to be doing after she graduates from Queen’s.

“I’m trying to decide between a few jobs. I haven’t decided yet, but [I’m going] off into the big, scary world I guess.”

Patrick Welsh, Law ’10, said he was excited and relieved to find out he had won.

“I had so many good friends take the time to write letters of support and nominate me and I really didn’t want to let them down,” he said, adding that he didn’t expect to win.

Welsh graduated from Queen’s in 2006 with a BA in biology and history. He did his master’s in history at Queen’s and then started law school here.

He was the AMS’s academic affairs commissioner in 2005-06.

Welsh said he focused on making student government accessible to students by pursuing small, tangible efforts throughout his term.

“We did simple things like increase the profile of the teaching awards committee, which gives out the AMS teaching awards,” he said. “We realized there was no physical trophy for the award we give to TAs so we had a trophy created, for example. … Very visible stuff.”

Welsh said he’s also worked to increase the Law Students’ Society’s profile in the Society of Graduate and Professional Students (SGPS) since starting law school three years ago.

“When I went to the SGPS, law students hadn’t been there in a very long time and the presence was minimal, if there at all.”

Welsh said he’s starting work in a Toronto law firm this August.

“After eight long years here, I know I’ll look back fondly at my time here very much,” he said.